“Don’t walk behind me, I may not want to lead. Don’t walk before me, I may not want to follow. Walk by my side and let us be friends.” -Thomas Mann In our fast-changing and troubled world, this quote contains a good underlying message for everyone: We are all in this together. As leaders in organizations, walking side by side and being friends with our employees is difficult. Yet we know we should not walk nor lead alone. An important …
This week I have the honor of hosting three of Ann Arbor’s most successful entrepreneurs. Today, Michelle Crumm, co-founder of Adaptive Materials, will be the guest presenter in my class at the University of Michigan Business School on “Managing Professional Relationships.” On Friday at my Leaders Connect Breakfast at Zingerman’s Roadhouse, Larry Freed, founder of ForeSee, will present. Next Monday Davy Rothbart, founder of Found Magazine, will also present to my class at the Business School (Davy will also …
Recently, I attended a special sneak preview, presented for Safe House Center in Ann Arbor, for a movie titled “Equal Means Equal” (you can watch a trailer for the movie HERE). In that event, the panel encouraged everyone to think about what they could do to stop violence against women. So today I ask myself this question, and ask you to consider the same: What can we do as leaders to stop the violence against women? I begin with …
“You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” ― Eleanor Roosevelt, You Learn by Living: Eleven Keys for a More Fulfilling Life This past Friday, we …
Many leaders tend to be competitive, hard-driving people. They have high intellectual IQs, but sometimes their emotional IQs lag behind. I coached one manager, let’s call him George, who had been one of the most successful salespeople at a financial services company. He’d been promoted to manager and was poised to move up to the next level. But as I worked with him, I quickly saw that he lacked the ability to connect well with others. One of the …
Life is not easy. We all have to face severe challenges, including illness and loss. Sometimes these events can devastate an individual or even a whole family. At other times the process of overcoming the adversity can lead to personal growth and development. How we manage these challenges often determines how well we will live our lives. Ann Arbor author and my friend, Jim Tobin, has made a career of writing biographies about people who have had to face …